Tuesday, 10 June 2008

A wedding

Last Friday I went down to Johor Bahru with my youngest sister, Nina, and her husband, Mack, to attend the wedding of my late cousin’s son, Mohd Rusydi Azfar to Dr Nurshabila.

The bersanding was held on Saturday. We drove down by car on Friday and in tow were Nina’s two children 11-year-old Sarah Hamidah and seven-year-old Heikal, and my eight-year-old grandson, Adam.

It’s been a while since I last attended a wedding of a relative. My late cousin, Dato Abdul Kadir Hj Sameon, died 11 years ago in a car accident while on his way to attend a wedding reception of a son of former State Secretary Dato Sulaiman. Dato Kadir was an Asst District Officer of Mersing and a District Officer Johor Bahru in the 70s and head of the State Religious Department in the 80s.

Mohd Rusydi Azfar, 25, the sixth child of Dato Kadir, had married Dr Nurshabila a week earlier. This time around it was the “majlis bertandang” a sort of a welcoming ceremony for the newly-weds at the groom’s house in Jalan Mariammah. Rusydi is a graduate of Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) while his bride, a graduate of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM).

With the passing years, I have taken the place of my dad and my late mom as a representative of the Samad family at family functions. During the years of my dad's detention under the ISA, it was my mom who representated my dad wherever there was a wedding or funeral to attend in Singapore. She’d fly down first with my late eldest sister, Arwah Kak Piah, Nina or Lalin (my second youngest sister) and my other siblings and I would follow suit. Most of my aunts have passed away and I take the opportunity to meet up with my relatives whenever such an occasion arises.

Talk about petrol hike: it cost my brother-in-law RM200-00 for two-full tank of petrol for a one-way trip. The cost of petrol for a two-way trip was RM400-00 excluding the toll cost of RM88-00 (two-way) and the expenses for accommodation at the Zone in the Free Trade Zone in JB.

Below are some of the pictures taken at the wedding. To Rusydi and Nurshabila, here’s wishing you guys:

“Selamat pengantin Baru dan Semoga Bahagia hingga ke anak cucu.”

The kompang boys beating the "kompang". It's a tradition to have the kompang group at a Malay wedding. The groom will be accompanied by the kompang boys whose job is to beat the kompang indicating the arrival of the groom and his delegation.

The "Raja Sehari" being led into the house by the bestman with the Kompang boys in accompaniment.

The groom and his beautiful bride on the bridal dais waiting to be blessed by the elders

Have a Heart: Save IJN

Israel’s assault on Gaza, by air, sea and now land, has killed (at the time of this writing) more than 600 Palestinians, with more than 2,700 injured. Ten Israelis have been killed, three of them Israeli soldiers killed by friendly fire. Beyond the deaths and injuries, the people of Gaza are suffering a dire humanitarian crisis that is dismissed by the Israeli government. There is, however, Israeli opposition to the military assault. Read here...

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Parents, guardians, and adults who care for children face constant challenges when trying to help keep children safer in today's fast-paced world.
The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) offers easy-to-use safety resources to help address these challenges.
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How does one explain the horrific fate that has befallen caged Gaza – a land saturated with rubble and body parts – carpet-bombed by air, invaded by ground, attacked by sea? Put to the test of history, Israeli “explanations” fail the credibility test. continue here---------------------------------------------Robert Fisk: Leaders lie, civilians die, and lessons of history are ignoredWe've got so used to the carnage of the Middle East that we don't care any more – providing we don't offend the Israelis. It's not clear how many of the Gaza dead are civilians, but the response of the Bush administration, not to mention the pusillanimous reaction of Gordon Brown, reaffirm for Arabs what they have known for decades: however they struggle against their antagonists, the West will take Israel's side. As usual, the bloodbath was the fault of the Arabs – who, as we all know, only understand force. ..Continue here

War on Gaza

Israel's failure to learnBy Nir Rosen (Aljazeera)

When George Bush, the US president, first entered the White House as the commander-in-chief in 2001, Palestinians were being killed in the al-Aqsa intifada.

Eight years later, as Bush prepares to leave office, Israel is carrying out one of the largest massacres in its 60-year occupation of Palestine.

The US, then and now, strongly backs Israel's offensive, justifying it as being, in fact, defensive.To continue read here ...